


The Mouse

by isquinnabel



Category: Gilmore Girls, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Magical Creatures, Muggles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-06
Updated: 2015-05-06
Packaged: 2018-03-29 07:20:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3887314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isquinnabel/pseuds/isquinnabel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Something was living in Richard’s office, and the strangest girl he had ever met came by to investigate further.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mouse

**Author's Note:**

> Written for A Ficathon Walks into a Bar, with the prompt _Luna Lovegood goes into a bar and meets... Richard Gilmore_.
> 
> This is set near the end of Season 2 of Gilmore Girls, sometime after the episode where Lorelai helps Richard set up his new office and he gets all enthusiastic about stationery. "My goodness, look at all the post-its!"

 

 

Richard Gilmore was very pleased with his new office.

He arrived on Tuesday morning at precisely 7:30, ready to start the day. He felt refreshed after an excellent night’s sleep. He felt energized, due to a particularly good breakfast and a brisk walk from his parking space. Most importantly of all, he felt right. Retirement had been a dreary experience, and he was relishing in the anticipation of an impending workday. Freshly minted sunlight streamed through the windows as he opened his briefcase, mentally running through the day’s schedule.

 _This_ , he thought to himself, _is exactly where I want to be_.

For the briefest moment, he thought he heard a noise – the vaguest echo of a whisper, the softest of footfalls – but then Karen strode through the door and brought him quickly back to earth. Any awareness of such noises melted away and he closed his briefcase with a snap. He greeted Karen with a cheerful “good morning!” and proceeded to request some clients’ files.

It was going to be a wonderful day.

\---

For weeks, Richard didn’t notice anything unusual – but he did. In quiet moments, he occasionally stopped what he was doing and listened hard, straining to hear whatever it was that had caught his attention. However, he would only allow himself to be distracted by this for about half a minute at a time. This was partly because he was a busy man dealing with important business, and he didn’t care for interruptions. But it was also because he was very aware of how ridiculous he must look, attempting to hear non-existent noises with an expression of intense concentration on his face.

Equally as often, he thought he caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. Of course, this was most likely nothing, but it happened with increasing frequency.

There was nothing more comforting to Richard than hard work. Whenever these odd moments came along, he picked up his pen with grim determination and kept going. He’d lose himself in insurance policies and international business statistics, and the thrill of it all would drive away any lingering thoughts of mysterious happenings and the causes thereof.

\---

Things changed on one particular day, after a meeting with a new client. He sat back down after the man left, and when he rolled his chair forward, he felt his ankles brush against something large and hairy. It was as if a terrier had settled itself down for a nap, curled up at his feet. He jumped out of the chair in alarm and looked underneath the desk.

The space was completely empty.

An hour or so later, the shock of this incident had begun to fade and he had successfully convinced himself that it was just his imagination. However, he still felt it would be prudent to raise the issue (not that there even was an issue, of course) with his secretary. 

“Karen,” he said, stirring his coffee with a deliberate show of nonchalance, “have you noticed anything strange around here lately?”  
Karen glanced up from her computer screen. “Strange in what way?”  
“Oh, you know… odd noises. That sort of thing.”  
Karen tapped the end of her pen against the desk, tilting her head thoughtfully. “I haven’t noticed anything, but if you’re hearing strange noises in your office we should get a professional to investigate. What kind of sounds are they? Should I call an exterminator? A plumber?”  
“An exterminator,” said Richard firmly. “And right away.”  
Karen shuddered. “Is it mice?”

He should have been horrified at the thought of a mouse living in the walls, but he clung to the suggestion with a substantial amount of relief. Mice! Mice were tricky things, capable of all sorts of mischief. They nibbled at unattended food. They made sudden bids for freedom, darting rapidly out of your field of vision. And they made all sorts of unusual noises, which were particularly noticeable when there were no other sounds to mask them.

Mice were pests and they carried disease; it was of the utmost importance that Richard rid his office of them at once. 

“Yes,” he answered. “I think it’s probably mice.”

\---

The exterminator, of course, turned up an hour and a half later than scheduled. Richard was in a dreadful mood by the time he finally arrived, and in an even worse mood when he declared that there was no evidence of mice. Not only that, but be claimed that there was no evidence of any pests at all.

“Check again,” Richard demanded. “You’ve missed something.”  
The exterminator shook his head. “Sorry, buddy. I was pretty thorough.”  
Richard broke out his best, most intimidating glare. “Well, you clearly weren’t thorough enough.”  
“Look, I’ve been doing this for forty-five years. There’s no mouse here. No mice, no rats, no cockroaches… I can’t find anything.”  
“Impossible,” snapped Richard. “I’m paying you for a service, and I’d like that service to be performed properly. _Check_. _Again_.”  
“Look,” said the exterminator, rolling his eyes, “I’ve done a pretty extensive search of this place, and there’s nothing I can do for you. I think you’re gonna need a specialist.”  
“A specialist?! I _have_ hired a specialist! _You’re_ supposed to be a specialist!”  
The exterminator dug around in his pockets.  
“Nah. Well, yeah, but not for what you need.”  
“What’s that supposed to mean?”  
He pulled a battered business card out of his pocket and handed it to Richard. It was a bright, overwhelming shade of purple with thick white text declaring _LOVEGOOD INC.: CREATURE DETECTION AND RELOCATION_.  
“Give her a call,” he said. “She’ll be able to deal with this.”  
Richard looked up from the card, more than a little confused.  
“Deal with what?”

\---

On Monday morning, Richard was feeling fresh and alert. He had reached a point in this new business venture where his routines were feeling comfortably stable, but still new and exciting enough to be invigorating. In addition, he had carefully put his strange conversation with the exterminator at the back of his mind. Karen was taking care of the arrangements for this other company to investigate the mystery (not that there was any mystery at all, catching a mouse should be more-or-less straightforward), and that was good enough for him. There was no need to even think about it. He was in a very good mood, ready to meet the week’s challenges head-on.

His good mood ended abruptly when he unlocked the door and found a young girl already inside the office, standing on her head.

“Who the hell are you!?” he demanded, dropping his briefcase with a loud bang.  
The girl tumbled to the ground. Her face was very flushed, presumably from the time she’d spent upside-down.  
“Good morning,” she said, a serene smile drifting across her face. “Are you Mr. Gilmore?”  
Richard drew himself up to his full height. The result was rather imposing, especially as the girl was still sprawled on the floor.  
“Yes, I’m Richard Gilmore and this office is private property. I demand to know who you are, and how you broke in! Trespassing is a crime, young lady!”  
He wasn’t sure what was more infuriating: this girl’s unexpected appearance in his office, or the fact that she seemed completely unmoved by his rage. She climbed to her feet, combing knots out of her hair with her fingers, as calmly as if he were doing nothing more threatening than hanging up his coat.  
“I’m calling the police,” he announced, striding towards Karen’s desk phone. “Perhaps you’ll have something to say for yourself when they request a statement – I can assure you, _I_ won’t be holding back!”  
He was about start dialling when the girl stopped playing with her hair, and slowly dropped her right arm back to her side; as her hand drifted downwards, all of Richard’s anger seemed to leech out of his body.  
“Er…” he started, adjusting to this new sense of calm. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”  
She proceeded to stare at him for a few unsettling moments, before offering her right hand.  
“I’m here to locate the creature in your office, Mr. Gilmore,” she finally answered. “My name is Luna Lovegood.”

Nothing about this girl inspired much confidence. Her handshake was strangely rhythmic, as though she were initiating a barn dance or a game of patty-cake instead of a business transaction. Her general appearance was extremely unprofessional: she wore ratty jeans with a hole in one knee underneath a long-sleeved floral dress, and her hair did not appear to have been brushed that morning. Plus, of course, there was the state in which Richard had originally found her.

“And why on earth, Miss Lovegood, were you standing on your head in my office?”  
“To see what it looked like upside-down,” she replied. And with that, she spun on her heel and bounced through the doorway towards Richard’s desk. He followed, intent on demanding further clarification, but Luna obviously considered the matter to be closed.  
“Now,” she began, “I’ve already finished the initial tests in your office. I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know that there are no Flaughnips, Mipnips, or Huddlenips – or anything at all in the Nip family.”  
“The Nip family?”  
“They were my first thought when your secretary described your problems to me, of course.”  
“But… that’s preposterous,” he spluttered, feeling his annoyance begin to flare up again. “Is this all some elaborate joke?”  
“Oh, not at all. It isn’t widely known, but Nips do rather enjoy office environments. They’re actually quite safe to have around, but I can understand wanting to remove them. Especially Mipnips. They’re harmless, but very unsettling.”  
“I don’t have time for this.” He rolled his eyes. “I’ve got work to do.”  
“Oh! Please, do go about your day as usual.” Luna sank to her knees, carefully examining the shadow cast by his coat rack. “I’ll work around you.”

\---

Richard did not like having this girl in his office. However, he decided that the simplest course of action would be to allow her finish her so-called “tests”. After they were done, she would leave without a fuss and he could forget she’d ever existed. Richard would not normally have had qualms about causing a fuss, but there was something unnerving about this girl. Much like the problem that brought her here in the first place, there was something about Luna that didn’t… fit. He could never have put this feeling into words, but his instinctive reaction was to let her stay and get on with things.

However, he still had his limits.

“What in the world are you _doing_?” he demanded, hurriedly ending a phone call to a client in Beijing. Luna, halfway through a mangled rendition of _You’re a Grand Old Flag_ , fell silent.  
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said. “Was I disturbing you?”  
Richard was getting a terrible headache.  
“Yes,” he snapped. “Was that really necessary?”  
Luna nodded.  
“Overt displays of national pride are irresistible to Gnitterlings, it’s the only foolproof way to detect them. They’re quite rare, but the air in here is unusually green, so…” She paused. “Actually, perhaps none are reacting because they know I’m not an American. Could you please recite the Pledge of Allegiance?”  
Richard slammed his desk drawer closed.  
“No!”

\---

By the time lunch rolled around, Richard was a hair’s breadth away from completely snapping. He had had to dedicate an unconscionable amount of time throughout the morning to dealing with Luna’s bizarre behavior. About an hour after his ill-fated phone call to Beijing, she asked him to weave sprigs of lavender into his shoelaces. Sometime after that, she began to discuss trifle recipes with various pieces of furniture.

He had never gone through so much grief for something as simple as catching a mouse.

He normally had his lunch delivered, but today he was in desperate need of a break. After giving Karen strict instructions to keep a constant eye on Luna, he escaped to the small diner across the street.

It was a wonderful reprieve. He usually didn’t get much enjoyment from the diner – the ambiance left something to be desired, in spite of the excellent food – but today, it was perfect. There was nothing quite like being surrounded by regular people, going about their regular business, and engaging in regular conversation. He could feel his world re-aligning around him, and he relished in how comfortable he felt. This diner may not have been his favorite place in the world, but at least he knew what to expect from it.

When he finished his sandwich, he crossed the street with some trepidation. He trusted Karen to keep Luna from doing anything too dreadful, but the girl had some unusual kind of pull. She somehow managed to get away with things that he’d never dream of letting anyone else do, and that fact made him very uncomfortable. He would almost prefer not to know what she had been up to in his absence.

When he opened the door, Luna practically leaped on top of him.  
“I got it!” she announced, brandishing a metal cage. It was completely empty, except for a layer of newspaper and a rather large carrot.  
Richard and Karen exchanged looks that fell somewhere between bemused and irritated.  
“You caught it?”  
“Yes!”  
“So… my office has been suffering from a carrot infestation?”  
“Oh, no, I put that there,” beamed Luna. “They like carrots. I thought he might be hungry.”  
“You thought _who_ might be hungry?”  
“The Quixicle! I should have thought of it sooner. They love mahogany, and your desk is quite magnificent.”  
It had been a very long day, and Richard’s inner five-year-old was dangerously close to the surface. It was all he could do to hold back a full-scale temper tantrum.  
“ _But there’s nothing there_!”  
She gazed peacefully at him.  
“Oh, there is. They’re just invisible to mugg—” she coughed. “Excuse me. They’re just invisible to… most people.”  
“Alright, that’s it.” The Richard’s frustration had, finally, reached tipping point. “First, you break into my office. Then, you spend the entire morning wasting my time with insane rituals and ridiculous questions. And now, you’re trying to convince me that you’ve caught something invisible! Something _selectively_ invisible! _There is nothing in that cage_! I don’t know what scam you’re running here, but I want no part of it! Get out of my office! Get out, right now!”  
By the end of this little speech, Richard’s face was bright red. Karen, who was yet to witness Richard in a rage, looked terribly nervous.

Luna, however, was as calm as could be.

“Of course there’s something in the cage,” she smiled. “What do you think is eating the carrot?”

Richard was about to bellow at her all over again, but he glanced down and noticed a distinct bite-mark in the side of the carrot. The words faded away before he could even get them out – had that bite been there all along? He didn’t remember seeing it. It wasn’t just some tiny little nibble, either. It was a large chunk; far too big to have been obscured by something as simple as looking at the carrot from a different angle.

He didn’t know what to do. All of a sudden, he was thoroughly confused and very, very tired.

“Karen will deal with your payment,” he murmured. He stormed into his office, slamming the door behind him. 

\---

Weeks later, Richard suddenly realised that the strange occurrences had ceased. Not only had they completely stopped, this development directly coincided with Luna’s visit.

“Well, of course it’s stopped,” he muttered to himself. Luna had probably frightened the mouse away with sheer eccentricity.

He picked up his best fountain pen and got back to work.


End file.
